Farewell Jack Tramiel (1928-2012)…Remember the Commodore 64?
Some of you using microcomputers in the 1980s may well remember the Commodore 64 as the best selling single personal computer in history. Others may remember the founder of Commodore International, Holocaust survivor Jack Tramiel (formerly Jacek Trzmiel) who passed away on April 8, 2012 at the age of 83. After learning to repair office equipment in New York City, Tramiel moved to Toronto in 1955 and founded Commodore Business Machines International which initially imported and then manufactured typewriters as well as adding machines. His company went public in 1962 and Tramiel moved to Silicon Valley in 1968 and began developing electronic calculators.
Some writers have contrasted Mr. Tramiel with the recently-deceased Steve Jobs of Apple fame. Tramiel was concerned with making microcomputers inexpensive and practical for the general public. For example, a Commodore 64 with 64 kilobytes of memory sold for US$595 in 1982 in comparison to the least expensive IBM PC with 16 kilobytes of memory costing US$1,565 at that time.
In 1984, two years after the Commodore 64 was introduced, Tramiel’s company achieved US$1 billion per year in sales and captured 42% of the domestic American personal computer market. However, Tramiel left Commodore after disputes with shareholders and company executives and founded Tramel Technology in 1984 which purchased Atari Inc. from Warner Communications following the 1983 crash of the video game market. Tramel Technology became Atari Corporation which manufactured computers and video game consoles from 1984 to 1996.
The Atari ST personal computer was released in the summer of 1985 and competed directly with Apple’s Macintosh and Commodore’s Amiga. The Atari ST was the first personal computer to have MIDI capability which facilitated the running of music sequencer software and ensured its popularity amongst musical bands and performers by relating digital musical instruments, computers and other devices to connect and communicate smoothly with one another.
3 thoughts on “Farewell Jack Tramiel (1928-2012)…Remember the Commodore 64?”
He will be missed. He was a visionary at the time, and there are many programmers who got their start on the C64, then moved onto the 8066 PCs.
Wow .. thanks for the flash back in the history of Commodore ..and the man who developed computers that were for the massive consumer market, the birthing of the personal computer at a affordable price, and the dream that everyone would be able to have one in their very own home to learn and write programs and play games. To think that a cassette player/recorder and a cassette tape was once used as a storage device for data on a computer. Thanks to folks like Jack Tramiel, Steve Jobs,Internet for all.
Marcia
When you look back at the rich history Mr. Tramiel and the genius of creativity of the Commodore one can’truly appreciate what you have. Mr.Tramiel taught about that sector of the public who could not afford to purchase computers at that expensive cost and made it affordable. He will be missed.